Death of a Red Arrows Pilot and unsung hero - Fl Lt John Egging

In my last blog 'Photographing The Red Arrows' I wrote how excited I was to be going to the Bournemouth Air Festival today and would have the second chance in two weeks to photograph The Royal Airforce Aerobatic Team, The Red Arrows.

What started as an excellent day, presenting the opportunity to photograph a number of different aircraft turned to tragedy when one the the aircraft crashed during a final manoeuvre over the local airport before landing.

I have had the pleasure of watching numerous Red Arrows displays over the years and never fail to be amazed at the skill that must be involved in making it look as easy although it obviously is anything but.

Fl. Lt. John Egging must be counted as one of our unsung heros. It was announced during the display that many of the pilots in today's display had recently returned from tours in Afghanistan and he had certainly served his time there supporting coalition ground forces. 

He obviously loved his flying. He transitioned from front line duties to entertaining the public with his flying prowess with the RAF Red Arrows and as such has etched himself certainly into my memory as 'The Egg Man', as was announced in the display commentary.

I don't know which aircraft he flew but I should imagine he has appeared in a number of my pictures from the last two weeks displays. I just want to publish this one from the display in Bournemouth today to say a simple 'thankyou' for for flying with the Red Arrows.

Kevin
Kevin Leighton Photography 

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Photographing The RAF Red Arrows

This week I wanted to get back more to my roots and into the world of photography. Those of you know or follow me that I have a preference for portrait and event photography with one golden rule. Fill the frame and use plenty of colour. This means I often stray into the macro world as well but my golden rule always stands.

Having this rule can lead to some frustrations as well. I read somewhere that in photography you are only limited by two things 'Your imagination and your wallet' and as the contents of your kit bag can be related to either, every now and then certain opportunities arise where you decide the contents of your kit bag just don't fit the bill.

Last weekend I was able to visit the Bristol International Balloon Fiesta which presents some wonderful opportunities for photographs of balloons in various stages of flight but one of the highlights, for me at least, is the attendance of the The Royal Airforce Aerobatic Team, The  Red Arrows which never fails to impress the audience.

So I did my homework and got a prime position where I could capture the display head on, the sky was mostly a dark blue, the sun was bright and when the aircraft were highlighted by the sun the were a deep red against the blue sky.


So, perfect position, perfect colour, perfect action though not always able to fill the frame. The individual aircraft make quite small targets for my 200mm lens but the groups shots really come together.



With an aerobatic display team for me you can't beat action shots that show movement, colour and angles.







There is a tendancy for display teams to keep clean lines and perfect formation so I also try to capture shots showing them in transition from one state to another whilst still keeping the shot interesting



But when it comes down to it some of those formations can be absoutely stunning in their own right.



Beauty, as they say, is in the eye of the beholder. These are some of my favourites from the show. I hope you enjoy them too.

What do you think? Do you photograph action events? What do you like to shoot and how do you do it? I'm off to the Bournemouth Air Festival this coming weekend. What's your advice?


Kevin
Kevin Leighton Photography

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Reflection on the news, Twitter and life in general

It has been a few weeks since I have written a blog. I'm not sure how many and I'm not going to look because it doesn't matter. What matters is that I'm back and I'm blogging.

So what's been happening in my life? It has just been so busy. The first two weeks in July included a photographic commission for networking group MumsUnltd, organising the first North Somerset and Bristol tweetmeet at The George Backwell and setting myself up on Google+ .

It all seemed so simple on the face of it but it turned out to be quite a challenge and there was no time for blogging what with everything else going on. Then followed a holiday, two weeks in a very warm and sunny Portugal at this apartment, enough to relax and unwind and start to reflect.

It was the middle weekend of the fortnight that reflection kicked. Although I wasn't watching any TV news I was dipping into Twitter and that's when bad news started to filter thru. The death of Amy Winehouse, train crash in China, shooting in Norway. Opinions dashed to and fro across Twitter as to which was the most shocking of the events and which deserved most focus or attention.

I was still removed from it all so I paid no more than a passing interest but still referred to Twitter for updates.

My return from holiday prompted a bout of post holiday reflection. I didn't watch the TV news or read newspapers but the story of a polar bear attack on some students and the riots in London started to break. Even then I didn't watch TV news but referenced Twitter for updates.

So where is all this going? For a start I was interested to analyse the fact that I really wasn't interested in following the news via the TV or newspapers. Was this disinterest because of being super busy and then on holiday, I think so. But then also of interest was why I would turn to Twitter for updates.

I think because Twitter provided me with easily scannable 'throwaway headlines' and URLs to blogs and web pages with detail I was really interested in. I could find opinion and articles from people I trust and value rather than those trotted out in front of me by the news organisations. Whether it's information from a professional reporter or just a regular man or woman off the street Twitter and blogging give the perfect platforms for direct access of information from trusted sources, and thoughtful opinion from experts and laymen alike.

My reading has been varied over this time and has included the wonderful art and colour of rachomini including her blog reference to 'The Seven Deadly Sins of Indoor Photography', the thoughtful analysis from Paula White on Twitter responses to the sad weekend of the death of Amy Winehouse, the Norway shootings, etc,. and reading about life decisions on this blog from John Foster. Add to this the calm reflections on life from journalist Rachel Burden and the man who can even make the weather interesting Ian Fergusson and I wonder why I need to go anywhere else for my daily dose.

What are your thoughts?

Kevin

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Another week, another shoot, beautiful colours and some lampshades.

Another week (and a bit), another late blog, another self-inflicted challenge but thankfully a successful photo-shoot.

Last Sunday I was lucky enough to be invited to the Tobacco Factory Market in Southville where ace lampshade maker Ruth McAllister a.k.a. Quincy Lampshades set out her stall. Ruth was interested in having some shots she could use on her website, twitter feed, facebook page or other publicity.

I was somewhat unsure of what to expect. After all, I am neither a serial market goer nor did I ever think I would ever be photographing lampshades. Always up for a challenge I was happy to oblige and thankfully the results were good.

Ruth builds a wall of lampshades on her stall that is quite stunning with a fabulous mix of colours and designs all jostling for pride of place.

I really want to thank Ruth for asking me to do this shoot with her and I look forward to some of the images appearing around the internet very soon.

All my favourites are on my web site here. Please come over and check them out. I feel sure you will enjoy looking at them as much as I did capturing them.

Ruth has also blogged about her experience and is showing her favourite images from the selection on her blog here. Please show your support by dropping in to say 'hi'.

Kevin

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Second Day Of My Workshop - and my Sweet Shot Tuesday Post 21/06

Last week I was telling you about the first day of two day workshop I was attending run by award winning photographer Morag MacDonald of Documentary Image. The first day was talking about how to gain control of your camera through effective use of the manual settings.



Day 2 of the workshop was building on the lessons of Day 1 and really concentrated on how to use the correct exposures to match the type of image you are trying to capture whether the deciding factor is the amount of light available, the speed of the subject or perhaps something a little more special.







I was excited by the opportunity to capture one of those images (it must have a special name) where a subject is static but the world around them is whizzing past. 






These were my favourite of the session but the later outdoor shoot provided further opportunity to play with exposure and capture .... rain .. yes rain, there was loads of it. But it provides its own opportunities and it take them where I can.




There are more images from the workshop on my Flickr stream which I hope you'll enjoy.


Kevin

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Revisiting The Basics - My Sweet Shot Tuesday 14/06

I am lucky enough to be on a two day course run by award winning photographer Morag MacDonald of Documentary Image. In some ways it's quite a basic course but being mostly self taught I wanted a course that would try to break me out of any bad habits I'd got into and make sure I understood what I was doing and why.




The premise of the course is to teach you full control of the camera by the using it in fully manual mode. Today we were playing with one of my favourite photographic toys, depth of field.

I have uploaded my favourite images of the day to my Flickr stream but just wanted to show a couple here because I've really rather enjoyed taking these. They come to you "out of the camera" as we are encouraged to get the exposure right first time and save on the need for post processing.









We went to an old dock side area in Bristol which is still mostly undeveloped from the days when Bristol was a bustling port city so there is lots of old debris still around which makes for interesting images.





Kevin

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Music and Furniture - Quite A Combination For One Week

Wow what a week - there seems to be no let up in the opportunities I've been presented with in the last few days to update my albums. It has pretty much got to the point where I've started to fall behind with the editing, cataloging and writing so now it's full on to start to catch up some.

Over the last week I was allowed to take a small photoset of keyboard and flute duo  Tranquillo as they played and was invited to shoot a Furniture exhibition being put on by a collective called Furnish.

OK perhaps not the sexiest of shoots (the furniture that is) but it was  great opportunity for me to get involved in something very different and have the challenge of photographing objects under exhibition hall lighting.

The images below are samples from both of these sets.

These girls busking at Cardiff Bay were a duo called Tranquillo  and were kind enough to let me take some shots of them as they played.

There is something about the Black & White of the keyboard that just lends itself to being reproduced in a Black & White image.

 
Perhaps my favourite shot of the set. Shot with a Pentax M50 lens I love the clean lines of the furniture in the foreground whilst the background start to dissolve away behind it.

Again, shot with the Pentax M50 I think great lines, good lighting and to me the intricate shadowing below the seat just adds to the picture.







As always I hope you have enjoyed these and that you'll visit my Flickr stream to see more.

Kevin


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